Dvi to Hdmi adapter and LCD TV but no sound.

[deziant]

I had my LCD TV hooked up to my computer using a VGA cord and standard audio cable for sound. The colors were to dull however on the tv. My video card only has 1 vga and 1 dvi. So I bought a dvi to hdmi adapter and hdmi cord. Color and quality are superb now but no sound.

I know hdmi has sound but dvi does not. Is there a way to keep my dvi to hdmi video and use the standard 3.5m audio cable to get my computer audio to play on tv?

I don't have the cash now to buy a new video card with built in hdmi.

 

[Dice144]

What OS are you running?

 

[Beer4Me]

I don't see why not. If you are using Win 7, just change the default audio device from HDMI to Speakers (analog), and you should be all set. If you're onboard audio has optical out, I recommend going that route instead as well. You can pick up an optical toslink cable from monoprice for like $3.

 

[deziant]

Running on XP atm. Sound works on tv if I switch to vga mode but I am using hdmi2 mode.

I looked under xp audio settings but didn't see any other options.

 

[deziant]

Running on XP atm. Sound works on tv if I switch to vga mode but I am using hdmi2 mode.

I looked under xp audio settings but didn't see any other options.

 

[deziant]

Running on XP atm. Sound works on tv if I switch to vga mode but I am using hdmi2 mode.

I looked under xp audio settings but didn't see any other options.

 

[Rifter]

Try optical audio, most TV's will not accept a Analog audio input with a Digital Video input.

 

[iCyborg]

I know hdmi has sound but dvi does not. Is there a way to keep my dvi to hdmi video and use the standard 3.5m audio cable to get my computer audio to play on tv?

It's not that HDMI has sound, and DVI doesn't, there are no pins or wires for sound in a HDMI connector/cable. DVI and HDMI are identical pin-wise - when you send video, there is some "blank time" where the video card outputs blank pixels to start a new line and for syncronization purposes. Someone smart came up with an idea to use this unused time to send audio (there's bandwidth to send 7.1 easily) and this is what HDMI does. The only reason GPUs don't output sound through DVI is of a legal nature, it's patented to be used by HDMI only. Not sure about nVidia, but ATI has some approved DVI->HDMI dongles that will support audio (the dongle maker pays the royalties, so it's legal for the video card to output sound through DVI), you would also need newer drivers. That would be the easiest solution, these cost <$10. You didn't mention which card you have, if it's older (and for nVidia you'd have to check if they have something similar), then this might not work.

 

[lsv]

All of your replies suck, guys.

Your audio is fine through line out. The PC is sending line out audio to the TV. The TV however does not take line audio when HDMI is selected, most will assume Video+Audio as a source. Check your TV for alternative audio inputs for the HDMI source.

 

[wahdangun]

what graphic card you are using ?
because before before nvdia gtx 4xxx, the graphic card doesn't have sound card build in, so they can't have sound over hdmi.

 

[Jionix]

You can have sound over DVI. It's not common, but possible --- My 4830 sends sound through the "Yellow" DVI connector on it. So I can use a DVI to HDMI cable and get sound on it.

 

[birthdaymonkey]

All of your replies suck, guys.

Your audio is fine through line out. The PC is sending line out audio to the TV. The TV however does not take line audio when HDMI is selected, most will assume Video+Audio as a source. Check your TV for alternative audio inputs for the HDMI source.

This is the first thing to try. I had to set up my parents' HTPC and there was a place in the audio options for the TV (a Panasonic Plasma) where you could specify which analog (RCA) jack you wanted to use for each HDMI input (you might need to get a 3.5 mm to RCA adapter to use this method). OP, Dig through the TV options and see if there's anywhere you can change this. And make sure your default output is set to "Speakers" in sound settings in the control panel.

 

[Zap]

Hello deziant, and welcome to AnandTech Forums.

What graphics card do you have? This might tell us if you are able to route audio through HDMI or not.

 

[Wyndru]

Hello deziant, and welcome to AnandTech Forums.

What graphics card do you have? This might tell us if you are able to route audio through HDMI or not.

I don't mean to threadjack, but I didn't want to make a new thread since my question sort of relates. Do most HDMI out video cards send the audio out via hdmi too? I don't see any info about audio on newegg's specs on cards that have hdmi ports.

Here is an example:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125281

 

[Binky]

Pretty much all of the AMD cards will send audio over HDMI. Some of the older generation Nvidia cards didn't do this but I think the newer Nvidia cards do send audio.

 

[Wyndru]

Pretty much all of the AMD cards will send audio over HDMI. Some of the older generation Nvidia cards didn't do this but I think the newer Nvidia cards do send audio.

Great, thanks for the answer. I'm setting up an older PC I have for HTPC, and was hoping I wouldn't need to run a separate audio cable.

 

[deziant]

I apologize for the delay, I just got back from a business trip.

The I am using is a GeForce 8400 GS 256MB 64-bit DDR2 PCI Express x16.

I tried searching my TV settings to switch audio source but could not find that option.

 

[dualsmp]

You need an audio pass-through from the motherboard to the video card to pass audio through the DVI->HDMI adapter. It's a small two or three pin cable which connects from the mobo to the video card. My 9600GT supports this and works perfect.

Go here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ImageG...20Video%20Card

It's the white connector at the top that looks like a fan connector but it is for audio.